This invention relates to interactive television program guides, and more particularly, to techniques for providing interactive television program guide functionality on multiple devices within a household.
Cable, satellite, and broadcast television systems provide viewers with a large number of television channels. Viewers have traditionally consulted printed television program schedules to determine the programs being broadcast at a particular time. More recently, interactive electronic television program, guides have been developed that allow television program information to be displayed on a viewer's television.
Interactive television program guides are typically implemented on set-top boxes. Such programs guides allow users to view television program listings in different display formats. For example, a user may instruct the program guide to display a grid of program listings organized in a channel-ordered or a time-ordered list. Users may also search or sort program listings by theme (e.g., movies, sports, etc.) or by title (i.e., alphabetically). A user may obtain additional information for a program by placing a highlight region on a desired program listing and pressing an “info” button.
Households with children are concerned with protecting children from the potentially objectionable adult content contained in the broad range of programs that are currently available. Some program guides allow users to block channels or programs using a parental control function. For example, a user may instruct the program guide to block access to channels that provide adult programs. A user must enter a password to regain access to such adult channels.
Another feature available on some program guides is the ability for the cable operator to send messages such as billing information to the user. A user may also have the ability to set reminders that will alert the user when a preselected program is about to begin or that will automatically tune the user's set-top box to the channel of the preselected program when the program is about to begin. A user may have the ability to establish a list of favorite channels. All of these program guide settings and features are specific to the user's set-top box.
Families often have multiple televisions and set-top boxes placed throughout the household. A family's household even may include multiple homes. Because there is no coordination between the program guides running on each of the various set-top boxes in the household, if a user adjusts the settings for a program guide on one set-top box, these settings are not communicated to the program guides on any of the other set-top boxes in the household. If a parent wants to restrict access to certain channels on all the televisions in the household, the parent must adjust the parental control settings on each set-top box individually. Reminders and favorite channel settings must similarly be set for each program guide separately if a user desires to have such settings be in effect throughout the household. Messages sent from the cable operator can only be sent to a particular set-top box. Some cable system subscriber management systems can allow a cable operator to manage all cable boxes within a home (i.e. manage billing for individual locations within a home). However, such systems do not allow user interaction with the cable operator.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a program guide system that allows a user to adjust to the user settings of a plurality of program guides at different locations within a household from a single location.